Shaping the Past: A Geometric Morphometric Approach to the Diversity of Lithic Tools in São Paulo State, Southeastern Brazil

Summary

This is an abstract from the "“The South Also Exists”: The Current State of Prehistoric Archaeology in Brazil: Dialogues across Different Theoretical Approaches and Research Agendas" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Geometric morphometrics is a powerful analytical method developed in evolutionary biology to study, quantify, and compare shape variations in biological specimens. Archaeologists have been applying geometric morphometric methods (GMM) to study shape variations in archaeological artifacts for more than a decade. GMM finds more frequent application in the field of evolutionary archaeology and lithic studies, where researchers can draw conclusions about cultural evolution, technological innovations, and the spread of ideas or practices in ancient societies by quantifying shape variations and changes over time. In this paper, we present partial results from the doctoral research currently under development by the first author, which is in its final phase. This project is framed within a cultural evolutionary approach and Cultural Transmission Theory, aiming to describe and compare the morphological variability of lithic bifacial points and lithic unifacial tools from hunter-gatherer groups in São Paulo State, Southeastern Brazil during the Holocene. Our objective here is to demonstrate how GMM is an effective tool for describing the variation in formal lithic artifacts by comparing different areas within São Paulo State.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• “The South Also Exists”: The Current State of Prehistoric Archaeology in Brazil: Dialogues across Different Theoretical Approaches and Research Agendas   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 38843.0